Historian arrested over Holocaust

David Irving in chains in Austria for what he said or for what he was suspected to have said 16 years ago. Questioning aspects of the holocaust, like the numbers, carries a sentence of up to 10 years in Austria

VIENNA, Austria (Reuters) — British historian David Irving, known for his controversial views on World War II, has been arrested in Austria on suspicion of denying the Holocaust, an interior ministry spokesman said.

Irving was arrested on November 11 near the town of Hartberg in the southern province of Styria under a warrant issued in 1989, interior ministry spokesman Rudolf Gollia said.

“He is on remand in Vienna,” Gollia said.

Asked what Irving had been arrested for, Gollia said: “It is to do with … Holocaust denial.”

The spokesman declined to comment on whether or when he would be charged.

A British High Court ruling in 2000 rejecting Irving’s libel action against an American professor and her publishers declared Irving “an active Holocaust denier … anti-Semitic and racist”.

Denying the holocaust is a crime in Austria which carries a sentence of 1-10 years.

Irving’s Web site (www.fpp.co.uk) said he had been invited by students to address a university association in Vienna. In a message dated November 11, it said he was on a one-day visit to the Austrian capital.